What the Hell am I Doing Here?

So, looking over previous posts, it has occurred to me how pretentious this blog is. These are reading like advice columns or editorials, and they're written by a guy who's never so much as featured in his home club. Why not learn from a guy who's actually toured?

Still, I have had crowds in stitches on occasion. I have been on the radio. Life could be worse. Most people live and die without ever having felt that kind of rush.

Maybe somebody who's had less experience than me might like this blog. Maybe somebody who's never done comedy but is considering it.

Or, maybe I'm just collecting my own thoughts. There's something to be said for that. I've generated some ideas for Matt and I to use since starting this blog. That's got to be how I look at this for now, especially since nobody (that I know of) is reading this.

At least I'm not boring anybody.

Difficulties of Guitar Comedy

Where have all the guitar comics gone?

Remember the Smothers Brothers? How about Tim Cavanaugh? Have I lost my mind, or was there a time when just about half the comics had a guitar at some point in their sets?

I submit that guitar comedy, while not dead, is definitely coughing up blood.

By far, the greatest active guitar comic of today is Stephen Lynch. His style is most like what Matt and I do -- just straight original songs. His punch lines are fantastic. His one weakness is that his set is incredibly blue. He had his own Comedy Central special, but I don't think he has a single song that is appropriate for network TV.

Why aren't there more guitar comics? Because it's so damn difficult to compete with traditional stand-ups, for the following reasons:

1. Punchlines Per Minute. In a comedy club, you need a high PPM rate, and musical comedy, which is restricted by its musical tempo and lyrical structure, is by nature slower.
2. Improvisation. An audience likes to be paid attention to. Some of the best moments in a comedy club happen while a comic is interacting with an audience, not necessarily planned material. It's much harder to adapt during a song (although I have seen it done on occasion).
3. Prejudice. I believe there have been so many bad guitar comics, that club owners and bookers are reluctant to put new ones on the stage. (Sam Cox, who taught me just about everything I know about stand-up in his weekly seminar, Comedy Gym, originally clued me in on this.) There are exceptions -- I talked extensively with the staff of Loonee's in Colorado Springs, and found them very helpful and informative, and I believe they would give a chance to guitar comics who can successfully negotiate the other difficulties.
4. Fan Base. Music fans go to see thier favorite artists over and over again. Comedy fans don't -- they may go twice or so, but then they've heard all the jokes. (Unless the comic writes all new jokes, which is nearly impossible with the difficulty of musical comedy.) Musical comics get the short end of both sticks.

In order to be successful musical comedians, we need to find ways to circumvent all of these difficulties. Matt and I got on the radio, but that's just not enough to make it in the comedy circuit.

I had a great conversation with a guitar comedy duo, Hard 'N' Phirm, when they were featuring at Cap City. Hard 'N' Phirm is comprised of Chris Hardwick and Mike Phirman. Chris Hardwick went up on the Velveeta Room's open mike night, and freaking rocked. Not an easy thing to do. Very funny guy. Mike is a graphic designer and all-around technical expert and musician.

When Matt was in town for our gig in April, we both went to see their act at Cap City. They have a very innovative answer to the PPM problem -- during their songs, the audience is shown a background video, which contains additional punchlines. It's an awesome effect. You can see for yourself on their media page, where they have video from two appearances on Jimmy Kimmel Live. Great stuff!

After their show, Matt and I had an extensive conversation with them. One thing they advised was playing music venues in addition to comedy clubs. They discovered (and I agree) that while music in a comedy club can be unwelcome, comedy in a music venue is almost always appreciated.

Another guitar comic worth mentioning is Rodney Carrington. He has some truly hilarious songs, and is often featured on Bob and Tom. But he's a shining example of the "Fan Base" problem. I went to see his live show. His stand-up is very good, and he ended the show with some songs. But the songs, even though I loved them, were anti-climactic. It's just so hard to get into musical comedy once you know all the punchlines, especially when the rest of the audience has also heard them many times and, while they're having a good time, they're not audibly laughing.

There's another difficulty I'm having trouble putting into words. I think the music industry is very fragmented now. There is no "Michael Jackson" phenomenon going on. Eminem was close for a while (and Dr. Demento had a veritable onslaught of Eminem parodies at the time). But guitar comedy gets easier when you have a musical thread that everyone in the audience has heard a lot. It doesn't necessarily have to be a parody, but really, all musical bits parody, maybe not a specific song, but definitely a genre or cliche. Think I'll need to elaborate on this topic in another entry. I don't think I'm making much sense.

There's another guitar comedy style I need to mention, and that's using the guitar to accentuate quick bits. J. R. Brow is a touring headliner from Austin who uses this technique. He's hilarious. It's not really what Matt and I do, although we've been moving in that direction by writing quick songs that last between 45 seconds and a minute, and have only one major (and perhaps one minor) punchline. It's a very effective technique for comedy clubs, and I would like to see Matt and I do more of that. Stephen Lynch's Smashing Pumpkins song is a great example, and J. R. has some better ones. (Check out his song, "Wait". And go see him live.)

Guitar comedy does have some advantages, however. Most notably, it fills the senses and is more emotional than just someone speaking. It can be a great way to wake up a tired crowd. When you've got hold of an audience, you can get them into a great frenzy (yes, I did that once at Flipnotics, of all places).

You just have to overcome a lot of adversity.

Blue

What is blue?

To paraphrase Stuart Smalley, "blue" ain't just a river in Egypt.

Blue is a word comics use to describe material as offensive. It's also the name of a very good song by A Perfect Circle. But that's not what concerns me now.

I've always been fascinated by what can be considered blue. Obviously, bad language and sex jokes are blue. But it gets a great deal more complicated than that.

A couple of years ago, I was asked to help write a skit for the officers at my company to perform at the annual employee meeting. Cool! The meeting had a Western theme. Well, I'm a big fan of "The Good, the Bad and the Ugly," so I think I can handle that. But then came the big stipulation:

No profanity, sex, violence, guns or alcohol.

Really? You want me to write a Western without mentioning guns or alcohol? Can I have one of the characters be a gunfighter? No. A bartender? No -- it counts as an alcohol reference. Well, what other recognizable characters were there? Do you know any good blacksmith jokes?

A year or so later, I performed "If I Were the President" for my corporate talent show. Different people were in charge, and they weren't as strict. The song has one very mild sexual reference, the word "ass", and a fat joke. Still, they let me perform it.

Most people loved it, but I found out later that there were multiple people who were offended. Which line was the biggest culprit? It was when I suggested that JFK was assassinated by the CIA. This floored me. The guy died over 40 years ago. Haven't you gotten over it yet?

I have long been fascinated by what some people consider offensive. If you get a chance, check out Jerry Seinfeld's documentary, Comedian. In it, an up-and-coming comic named Orny Adams gets his big break to appear on late night network TV. He's prepared to do his signature bit, where he thinks he might have lupus. The same set he's done over and over again for years. But the network people ask him to change the joke from "lupus" to "psoriasis". Why? Because lupus is a serious medical condition, and somebody out there in TV land is suffering from it, and will be watching the show and get offended. It's not that the joke would violate any FCC regulation, it's just that they want the show to entertain, while generating the fewest possible complaints for the network.

You never know what's going to offend people. At a night club, you can be just about as raunchy as you want. Pretty much nobody goes out who's easily offended -- they know better. But when you have a corporate gig, your audience is at its place of employment. They have a right to go to work without being exposed to any kind of offensive material.

And that's why I'm writing this now. Matt and I (who together form the Fuzzy Carrot Nipples comedy-rock band) have gotten a corporate gig. We're going to be performing at USA Swimming's employee appreciation party. Now we've got to go through our songs and determine what's appropriate and what's not. He's already expressed concern over "President" because of the fat joke. (Although, we both think that the Colorado Springs crowd would be okay with joking about a dead liberal.)

I think it's important to write non-offensive material. Otherwise, you'll never be able to make it on TV, or hold a corporate gig. If you only do blue, then you may be a successful comic, but you really won't ever truly master entertainment -- there will be a huge population segment that you simply don't know how to entertain.

There's a club in Dallas that won't let you perform anything blue. It's called "Back Door Comedy". I performed there once, and had a great time doing Sgt. Hardwick. I like the idea that it's there, and I like to think of it as a training exercise.

For anyone concerned, my Western skit ended up involving a snake oil salesman, and it was moderately funny without being offensive to anyone (that I know of).

And if you haven't yet, pick up a copy of Thirteenth Step by A Perfect Circle. You'll love it, if you're not an uptight prick.

When to Trust an Audience

You spend many nights performing your material. You need to know what's funny and what's not, and you've learned that the only way to find out is to try it in front of an audience. That's the first lesson in comedy.

One night, you get up on stage and try out a bunch of new material. You're not all that impressed with the audience response. You get off the stage, see someone you know, make eye contact, shake hands, and he tells you, "Hey, you did great." You're thinking, Really? I was planning to ditch that material and try something else, but if he thought it was great...

Ditch the material.*

You need to know what works, but there are times when an audience will lie to you. Have you ever gone to see your friend's band, perhaps performing for their first time? Did you tell them they were great, even though you'd rather be getting a root canal, because the Muzak is more appealing? This guy's doing the same thing. He's not trying to hurt you, in fact he's trying to help you. But he may be inadvertently harming your future comedy. Social pressure is the cause, and you have to keep it from affecting your act.

But if you can't trust an audience, then how can you ever know what's funny? The answer is, you can trust an audience. Sometimes. Here are some guidelines that I am coming up with as I write:

1. If someone goes out of their way, even a little bit, to compliment you, you can usually trust that. Any email, instant message, or text message, if unexpected and unaccompanied by another purpose (like asking for a favor), can usually be trusted. A stranger that walks across a crowded room to shake your hand can be trusted.
2. Someone who compliments you publicly, like posting on a forum, broadcasting an email, announcing on national TV, whatever, is staking her reputation. She can be trusted.
   
3. Anyone with something to gain by you being happy, like a business partner, cannot be trusted.
4. Some people are more trustable than others. Does this person compliment everybody? If you've never heard him compliment anybody before, then either he's hitting on you (see #2), or you've really done something good. Putting this rule in poker terms, respect the raise of a tight player.
5. If someone tells you that anything about your set sucked, then unless they're trying to pick a fight, they're telling the truth.
6. Anybody who's worked in a club for more than a few months knows what works, and generally will not lie. Trust them, even though they may fall into the #2 category.
7. If an audience is laughing during your set, trust it. If an audience is silent, they may still be having a good time, you don't really know (and you may want to ditch your material for some conversation). If an audience is leaving, you're sucking.
   

I'm bringing this up because I've gotten some very positive feedback from Spite Club. Friends I saw after the show said they really enjoyed it. I appreciate that, but I won't use it as information. I got an instant message out of the blue from my friend Kent, who said, "By the way, in case I forgot to mention it last night, I thought you did great." Okay, I must have left a very good impression. If I had sucked, and he had forgotten to compliment me that night, I'm sure he wouldn't have gone out of his way to lie the next day.

But I think the kicker has been that the host, John Rabon, broadcast an email, and then posted on the Velveeta Forum that Todd and I both kicked ass. That's awesome. He's not lying.

Conclusion: I honestly had a great Spite Club. What should I do now? These steps, in order:

1. Pat myself on the back.
2. Feel good for a moment.
3. Get it out of my head and do more writing.

Hope this helps.

--Dan


* Actually, you should only ditch the material after it has failed two out of three times, according to Austin comedy legend J. R. Brow. I agree. But for the sake of argument, say this was the second time you tried the material, after it had failed once.

Find the Funny!

I won Spite Club last night.

Actually, nobody really cares who won. It's only reason for existing is to be entertaining to an audience. If you have a poor show, but you win Spite Club, you feel like crap. If you make people really laugh, you feel great.

Both Todd and I feel great.

I had stacked the audience in my favor. Brought about 12 friends. Since Todd doesn't even have 12 friends, I had the advantage. Todd won the trivia round, then I won the insults. I think the freestyle round was close, but the fact I had so many friends there helped me edge him out. I had people tell me my set was great, and Todd often heard that he should have won. Seems like a dead heat to me.

In the trivia round, the questions were written by Matt Bearden. They all followed an anti-George-Bush theme. One of the questions was to spell "hypocrisy". I dinged in and misspelled it "hypocrasy". And while it's true I look like a doofus in front of the many friends I brought, what I really regret was that I didn't find the funny.

There was funny in the question. I'm 31 years old, and I found myself in a spelling bee. What should I have done? I suspect that if I had spelled "G-E-O-R-G-E B-U-S-H" that Matt would have counted it correct. But I really should have asked for a definition, and to use it in the form of a sentence. I bet Matt had something prepared for that, and even if he didn't, he could have made something up. I also could have asked for the etymology, but that would have been pushing it.

Always find the funny.

I also regret a comment I made during the insult round. It wasn't part of the insult, and it was kind of funny, but also racist. Not targetted at anyone in particular. I didn't have to say it, in fact, I had planned to yank it, but it's out there. I don't think anyone was offended, but still, I should have kept that one to myself.

Lots of the insults, obviously, went blue. You would have needed one of those clicky things to count the fellatio references. But I think the best laugh of the insult round was a clean one. It was when I said that all Todd's work in comedy paid off, that he made his big show business break, that you could catch him every night at a comedy club performing -- his dishwashing duties. A totally clean, well-written line. I ought to try doing more well-written material.

One thing -- the winner of Spite Club used to be able to choose where he went in the list for the open mike. Last night, the open mike host, Art Mack, put me way near the end. Open mike started at 10, I went up well after 12, and it was all over at 12:30. Obviously, all my friends (who had been there since 9:30) were gone by then. I like the old way for that reason -- it's a way the club can say "thanks for bringing the audience". I understand that there's a good chance that after I go up, most of them will leave. But now, I'll be less likely to bring them in the first place. It's a tradeoff and I think they've made the wrong choice.

All in all, a very fun night. Todd says he'll help me write against whomever I'm up against next.

Bring it on.

Spite Club is Tonight!

Had a great show on Tuesday night. Other comics didn't fare so well.

The crowd was sizeable, but a lot of them were chattering and weren't paying attention. That makes things very, very difficult for a comedian. A lot of us were having trouble controlling the atmosphere. Even John Rabon, the headliner, was fairly hard to hear among the ambient noise. Still, about half the room was paying attention, and he was getting a lot of laughs from them.

For my set, when I saw how unruly the crowd was, I decided to ditch the guitar comedy bits and instead go into my Sgt. Hardwick. He screams, and doesn't use the microphone. He's also very, very funny. I felt like I had the best set of the night (not counting Rabon), although Sean Kerry had a great one too.

Later that night, during karaoke, Todd Merriman and I started trading insults in preparation for our Spite Club round, coming up tonight. That's gonna be some really, really funny shit. I'm a little nervous about my freestyle round, though, when I'm going to be doing an interpretive dance based on the life of Todd Merriman, set to the music of Tocatta and Fugue in D Minor by Bach. I haven't rehearsed it in front of anyone, and the first thing you learn about comedy is you never know what's funny until somebody else laughs.

We'll see...

Upcoming Shows

I've got two shows coming up that I'm looking forward to.

First, there's a show which I call "Comedeoke". We do it every other Tuesday, and next Tuesday will be the second one we've ever done. It's a 2-hour comedy show at a karaoke bar, and of course it's followed by karaoke.

It's hosted by my friend Bailey. Good guy. He's from Denver.

There are a couple things I especially like about this show. First, it's a great venue for me to do guitar comedy. Comedy clubs are tough places for it, for various reasons. But in a karaoke bar, the sound system is great for music, and more importantly, the people are musically-minded. While I don't do direct song parodies, I often use a particular kind of music as the basis for a punch line, and it helps to have people familliar with the premise.

I also think Bailey has made a good choice by having a headliner every show. See, these comedy nights pop up every once in a while, and almost always die quickly. But by making each show unique, he's giving audiences a chance to come back. Also, depending on the comic, the headliner might be able to get his/her friends to come out for that one special show, whereas friends tend to have difficulty acquiring the willpower to make it out to a show that happens every other week.

That show is happening at the Canary Hut Pub at 8:00 this Tuesday.

The second show is Spite Club at the Velveeta Room. That's going to be exciting.

This time of year, every Thursday (before the regular Open Mike Night) we're holding Spite Club, which pits two local comedians against each other in a battle of insults, trivia, and 5-minutes of anything-goes stage time (with the stipulation that you can't do your act). It's a lot of fun.

This Thursday will be my Spite Club debut, and I will be going against my friend Todd Merriman. His writing is clever, but I think he often has trouble getting to a punchline quickly (and I've told him so).

The thing about Spite Club is that it really doesn't matter who wins -- both comics are really just trying to entertain the audience. True, the winner moves on to the next round (it's a single-elimination tournament), but who cares? So Todd and I have been getting together to discuss what we're going to be doing. I don't want to give away anything, but I really think it's gonna be a lot of fun. (So come out if you can!!!)

It's Alive!

I've wanted to start a blog for quite a while, and now I've finally done it. This is every bit as fun as I thought it would be. And by that I mean it's marginally good.

I suppose I should introduce myself. I'm a computer programmer living in Austin, Texas, but at night I fancy myself a stand-up comedian. I created this blog to discuss my life as a comic. I've only been doing it for about two years, and so many nights I feel like I have so much more to learn. Yet I also have often been reminded that I have compiled a significant amount of expertise in that time.

Who would be interested in this blog? Mostly my family and friends, I think. Anybody who's interested in stand-up comedy, especially guitar comedy, perhaps. Maybe other kinds of writers/performers. Maybe just people with too much time on their hands. I don't know.

So, with that, buckle your safety belts and stow your tray tables, because this comedy Hindenberg is about to take off...